3641 Watson Road

Year Built: 1936

Architecture Style: Art Moderne

Key Features:

• Smooth Surface
• Flat roof
• Small Portico

This home was built in 1936. It is unusual because of the design and floor plan. The original owner was a doctor. He and his wife commissioned this house based upon their values of function and use. The rendering in the original Indianapolis Star feature article shows the house then almost exactly as it looks today. The design was avant garde for its time and location. Art Moderne and Art Deco were becoming popular in California, due in part to the inspiration of the movie industry, but they had not made it to very many residential neighborhoods in the Midwest. This house stands in stark contrast to the period revival homes that are predominant on the street, much as Frank Lloyd Wright’s Prairie School homes did in the neighborhoods where they were built 30 years before.